Truth Based Thinking

By Gregg Fetter

Truth Based Thinking takes you on a step-by-step journey into objective truth.

• Learn the difference between relative truth, absolute truth and transcendent truth.
• Learn why some truth is discovered and other truth is revealed.
• Learn how to find truth beyond yourself.
• Learn the difference between real faith and blind faith.
• Learn how to LIVETRUE expressing your own unique vision.
• Be able to explain to people why you believe what you believe.

Truth Based Thinking is based in objective fact and is compatible with the Bible.

22,000 words. Illustrated by world class artist Wilfred Hildonen.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Gregg Fetter
• Release date: Jun 6, 2012
• ISBN: 9781476008806

Gregg Fetter

Hello my name is Gregg Fetter. As the son of a military father, I lived in Germany and traveled extensively throughout Europe visiting, England, Holland, France, Spain and Switzerland. As a result I experienced a wide variety of people, cultures and belief systems. And now, working as a Flight Attendant for a major U.S. air carrier since 1984, I continue to meet and share with people from all walks of life: senators, actors, news anchors, religious leaders (ascetic Jew, Amish, Anglican priest), business men, elderly, physically challenged, the sad, the lonely, etc. My travels to every major U.S. city including Hawaii, Alaska, Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean, Central and South America, have given me a unique perspective on how people think and helped me develop TRUTH BASED THINKING. My educational background is in philosophy, communications, theology and world religions having studied at Grand Canyon College in Phoenix, Arizona and Baylor University in Waco, Texas.

Book preview

Truth Based Thinking

Gregg Fetter

TRUTH BASED THINKING

Copyright © 2012 by Gregg Fetter

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission from the author. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Illustrations by Wilfred Hildonen

Smashwords Edition

Contents

Introduction

Search For Truth

Find Truth

Understand Truth

Apply Truth

Spread Truth

Appendix

About Gregg Fetter

What is truth?

— Pontius Pilate A.D. 30

Introduction

It was dark when John F. Kennedy Jr., his wife Carolyn and sister-in-law Lauren took off from the Essex County airport in New Jersey headed for Martha’s Vineyard on July 16, 1999. Weather conditions were poor. Although other pilots had cancelled their flight plans, Kennedy insisted on flying even though he was not instrument qualified. As he flew into the haze hugging the Atlantic ocean, there were no lights to see along the shoreline, there were no stars overhead. Even so, everything seemed fine until he began his descent into the Martha Vineyard airport. As he approached the airport he made two right turns and became disoriented. A review of the radar data indicates that he accelerated to a speed 10 times that of a normal decent and crashed out of control into the ocean killing all aboard.

Authorities would later tell us that the cause of the crash was spatial disorientation. Spatial disorientation happens when a visual horizon is lost due to poor weather conditions. Without a point of reference, such as lights along a shoreline or stars in the sky, a pilot becomes disoriented not knowing where he/she is relative to the ground.

As in flying, reference points are critical in LIFE. If we don’t have reference points our lives can easily go astray.

That’s what truth does. Truth provides a reference point from which to guide our lives. Without truth we are lost.

But what is truth?

Search for Truth

In this chapter I discuss two types of truth: Relative and Absolute. I also offer a Truth Finding Method you can use in your own life to produce truth.

Find Truth

In this chapter I discuss Transcendent Truth. Transcendent truth is truth beyond the five senses. By definition then, is transcendent truth attainable? To find out, I propose three objective questions that let you make your own determination.

Understand Truth

Just because you find truth doesn’t mean that you will understand it. A caveman can stumble upon a computer and not understand what it’s used for. The truth of the computer is there, but that doesn’t mean the caveman knows its purpose. In this chapter I’ll make sure you understand truth so you can use it to your benefit.

Apply Truth

In this chapter I show you how to apply truth so that it meets your needs. We’ll discuss the difference between Purpose Motivation and Needs Motivation, two different ways of approaching life and your situation in it.

Spread Truth

Truth is something to be shared. Vision lets you do it in a way that expresses your personality. This chapter will help you find vision for your life.

So let’s begin. Let’s discover together what truth is and where to find it!

Search For Truth

As I explained in the Introduction, truth is a reference point from which to guide our lives. But how do you go about discovering what’s true?

With nowhere else to look, most people use what works for them as reference points for their lives. This is called Relative Truth, because what works for you is relative to what works for me.

Relative Truth is like looking at the world through a peephole. What you see may be true enough, but it is only part of the whole.

John Godfrey Saxe brings this concept to light in his famous version of the Indian legend The Blind Men and the Elephant.

This is a poem about six blind men who come across an elephant and each describe it according to their point of view.

The Blind Men and the Elephant

by John Godfrey Saxe

It was six men of Indostan

To learning much inclined,

Who went to see the Elephant

(Though all of them were blind),

That each by observation

Might satisfy his mind.

The First approach’d the Elephant,

And happening to fall

Against his broad and sturdy side,

At once began to bawl:

"God bless me! but the Elephant

Is very like a wall!"

The Second, feeling of the tusk,

Cried, — "Ho! what have we here

So very round and smooth and sharp?

To me ‘tis mighty clear

This wonder of an Elephant

Is very like a spear!"

The Third approached the animal,

And happening to take

The squirming trunk within his hands,

Thus boldly up and spake:

I see, quoth he, "the Elephant

Is very like a snake!"

The Fourth reached out his eager hand,

And felt about the knee.

"What most this wondrous beast is like

Is mighty plain," quoth he,

"‘Tis clear enough the Elephant

Is very like a tree!"

The Fifth, who chanced to touch the ear,

Said: "E’en the blindest man

Can tell what this resembles most;

Deny the fact who can,

This marvel of an Elephant

Is very like a fan!"

The Sixth no sooner had begun

About the beast to grope,

Then, seizing on the swinging tail

That fell within his scope,

I see, quoth he, "the Elephant

Is very like a rope!"

And so these men of Indostan

Disputed loud and long,

Each in his own opinion

Exceeding stiff and strong,

Though each was partly in the right,

And all were in the wrong!

John Godfrey Saxe’s poem is quite compelling. We learn that while relative truth can be partly right, it can also be completely wrong. That’s because relative truth isn’t always objective. Our views can be mixed with subjectivity. For example, a woman who has had bad experiences with men might describe all men as pigs. However that isn’t true. ALL men aren’t pigs. Her objectivity is tainted by her subjective opinion. That is why relative truth does not always work. A great definition for relative truth is that it works for some people, in some situations, some of the time.

With that in mind, we have to realize that while relative truth may work for us some of the time, it isn’t a good reference point for our lives. It’s too unreliable. What’s needed is truth that has a greater degree of objectivity. How do we find that?

Truth Finding Method

I work on airplanes. I’ve been a Flight Attendant since 1984. During this time I’ve witnessed thousands, even hundreds of thousands of people put their lives in the hands of a person they’ve never met. Who? The pilot! Have you ever stopped to think about that? Why would people be willing to do that?

The answer is OBJECTIVE EVIDENCE! In life, they have accumulated enough empirical evidence to